Growing Tomatoes from Seeds

There is no greater reward in tomato gardening than growing tomato plants from seeds that you planted yourself.  After all, isn’t this what gardening is all about? There are a multitude of varieties to choose from and you will want to experiment with many to find the ones that suit your taste the best.

Timing is everything in planting your seeds.  You will want to sow your seeds indoors roughly eight weeks prior to your projected outdoor planting date. This will give them sufficient time to grow.  Find a flat tray with a clear lid.  Make a mixture of potting compost and sphagnum peat moss and line the tray about one inch thick. Sow your seeds about an inch apart covering them with your soil mixture no more than 1/8”.  Water the seedlings sufficiently so as to make the entire potting bed moist. A small aerated watering can will do the trick here. Place the clear cover over the tray and place the tray in a warm, sunny location like a windowsill.  Tomato seeds love warmth so this covered tray will hold the heat in and you should see new growth in a few days. Once all the seedlings appear, remove the cover, leaving the tray in the sunlight and begin monitoring more closely as the air will dry out the soil a little quicker.  Take care not to over water the seeds so that there is standing water on the bottom of the tray. Another alternative is to purchase a seed starter kit from a local home and garden center which simplifies this process quite a bit.

Let the new seedlings grow in the tray until they reach a height of two inches.  At this time it will be time to transplant them into their own individual containers to keep their roots from getting tangled with another plant. You will want to select a container that is roughly four inches wide and deep to be able to support a six to eight inch tomato plant which will then be ready to transplant to your outdoor garden. Ready the new individual containers by filling them about ¾ full with the same potting medium you used in the tray.  Make a small hole in the soil large enough to receive the new seedling.  The seedlings are extremely fragile at this early stage of development so use a spoon to dig them out of the tray and place them into the new container.  Add additional soil as needed and press the soil down lightly around the roots to make sure the roots are in good contact with the surrounding soil.  You will want to keep the seedlings in the same or another similar sunny area turning the containers every couple of days so the new tomato plants continue to grow straight up.

Once the seedlings reach a height of about six inches, they are almost ready to be transplanted to your outdoor garden.  Before this final transplanting, the seedlings need to be “hardened off”. This is a simple process that readies the plant for the harsher outdoor  temperature and environment.  You will want to move the seedlings outdoors, into the direct sunlight, for a few hours each day.

Once the danger of frost is past and the temperatures are warm enough, it is time to transplant your tomato seedlings to your outdoor garden.  Plant your seedling deeper into the soil so that you cover up the bottom 1 or 2 leaves and leave the top 3 or 4 leaves exposed. Tomato plants have the ability to grow roots all along the stem so by doing this, the plant will develop a stronger root system and grow more vigorously. Take extra care when it is time to stake or cage your tomato plants that you don’t puncture the roots.